The Irish Microsoft Technology Conference (IMTC) 2008 is a three day conference running from 7pm on Wednesday 2nd April till Friday 4th April, in Dublin.  Full details of the agenda can be found at http://imtc.firstport.ie/agenda.aspx, and it looks pretty impressive, with 8 tracks and 40 sessions of great technical content with some excellent speakers.

I'll be there to deliver a session on Internet Information Services 7 for ASP.Net Developers, and this will be my first ever visit to Ireland, so I'm really looking forward to going over and having another opportunity to speak on a topic which I have great passion for. 

There is a great offer for the first 300 people who complete their registration for IMTC as they will receive a personal copy of the IMTC 2008 DVD showing ALL 40 Sessions, interviews and Keynotes - so go on now - get yourself booked in for what looks to be an excellent conference and excellent value for money.

Yes, it's true, as has been muted on a number of blogs recently, on Saturday May 3rd 2008 the Developer Day Crew will be heading over  to Galway to take the DDD Concept/Event/Cracking Day full of Developer Content to the Emerald Isle!  Once again this will be a free event and the line up of speakers and content is looking very, very impressive - http://www.dddireland.com/agenda-1.htm; plus as an added bonus there will be a full track covering WCF, delivered by Dominick Baier, Christian Weyer, Daniel Fisher and Michael Willers!

Registration is now open for what is shaping up to be a great event so I advise any Irish Developer to take a look at the agenda and get yourself there, after all it's on a Saturday, it's free and it's by The Community FOR the Community! - http://www.dddireland.com

It's getting closer and I'm probably a little late in posting about this but hoping I catch the eye of a number of developers in the North of England.  Developer Day Scotland is being held in Glasgow on Saturday 10th May and the session voting is now open.  If you are considering attending DDS this is a great way to have a chance to influence the content of the day - so get voting now! - Developer Day Scotland!

The dates and venues for the MSDN and TechNet Roadshows for 2008 have been announced.  So register soon to avoid disappointment.

MSDN Roadshow Dates and Venues

• Cardiff - 21st April 2008
• London - 25th April 2008
• Manchester - 1st May 2008
• Glasgow - 13th May 2008
• Newcastle - 16th May 2008

TechNet Roadshow Dates and Venues

• Cardiff - 22nd April 2008
• London - 24th April 2008
• Manchester - 30th April 2008
• Glasgow - 12th May 2008
• Newcastle - 15th May 2008

I'm registered and will be attending the Newcastle MSDN Roadshow so I hope to see some of you there!

Tonight I travelled to Peterborough (Big thumbs up to National Express East Coast for the free wi-fi access to all passengers!!) for the first VBUG meeting of a new VBUG region.  We have a new coordinator in Jyoti and I would like to thank her for all her hard work in getting the meeting together and a big thanks to Johnston Press for hosting the event for us and supplying plenty of additional swag. Big thanks also to Richard for travelling to Peterborough to present.

We had a great evening filled with technical content, pizza and the obligatory swag.  Richard covered many aspects of TFS and gave a good overview mixed with personal experience and tips and tricks.  To access Richard's slides please go to DDD5 Presentation - Team Foundation Server and why not also check out Richard's Blog - But It Works On My PC!!

This is the start of a new region for VBUG so we welcome you to attend if it is local to you.  If there is a topic you would like to see covered at forthcoming meetings please contact me through this blog or contact VBUG, alternatively if you would like to speak at a VBUG meeting please contact VBUG and we will look at putting a meeting together.

The details of the next VBUG Meeting in Newcastle have been announced.  I am very pleased to announce that we have Oliver Sturm visiting to cover .Net 3.0 and to put some fun into it with a Game Challenge!

Topic: VBUG: '.NET 3 - The Game Challenge' with Oliver Sturm

Overview
.NET 3 - The Game Challenge

Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) are two important pillars of Microsoft's next generation development platform. Since Visual Studio Orcas has been released, these components are becoming relevant in every day developer life. This session provides an overview of both technologies by demonstrating their combined use in a network enabled Connect Four game.

Location: Royal Station Hotel, Neville Street, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE1 5DH http://www.royalstationhotel.com/

Price: FREE

To Register go to: http://www.vbug.com/Events/February-2008/VBUG-LINQ-with-Oliver-Sturm.aspx

PLEASE NOTE THE CHANGE OF VENUE.  The issue of venues is a particularly pertinent one with the Newcastle Area and one which I would like to discuss with any delegates who attend this meeting or who regularly attend VBUG/SUGUK Meetings in the North East.  I have a number of options which I will be outlining and discussing at this meeting.  If you have any thoughts on any locations in Newcastle or the surrounding area which would offer a FREE monthly evening venue for VBUG and SUGUK meetings with good transport links, please let me know.

Tony Rogerson has sent through details of the forthcoming SQLBits 2008 Community Day in Birmingham.  Registration is now open and I expect that it will fill soon so if you would like to attend please register quickly and support Tony and the rest of the team on what looks to be a great day.

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Registration is now open for SQLBits 2008 March event.

Come and join us at the Lakeside Conference Centre in Birmingham for SQLBits (the sql); believe me the sessions are way better than the punch line! We have kept costs low with help from our sponsors, so low in fact it's free to attend again.

20 technical Sessions broken up into 4 tracks covering all areas a SQL Pro is interested in and on top of that a recruitment panel and new product demonstrations - something for everybody - Development, DBA, Business Intelligence and of course SQL Server 2008. Check out the confirmed sessions.

Technical Sessions end at 5pm but the day continues first with a Recruitment panel and New production demos and then into an informal networking and social evening at our Group By drinks reception - a great opportunity to relax and chat about our holidays, hobbies, ok - get real - more SQL!

Register quickly; we ran out of places in 8 days at the October 2007 event.

Register Me For SQLBits 2008

Technical Session List:

SQL Server 2008
Making more of SSIS in 2008
Reporting in SQL Server 2008
SQL Server 2008 – Declarative Management Framework concepts & database problem solutions with policy management.
Where do you live? Intro to spatial indexing
SQL Server 2008 TSQL Enhancements

Business Intelligence
Using Analysis Services as a data source for Reporting Services reports
Extending SSIS with custom Data Flow components
Master Data Management (MDM)

DBA
SQL Server High Availability and Disaster Recovery Overview
What Are You Waiting For?
I/O! I/O! It’s off to disk we go...
Introduction to SQL 2008 Performance Data Collector
"SELECT TOP(@x) Name FROM MyFavouriteDMVs ORDER BY MyRanking"
Administering SQL Server 2008 and 2005 with Windows PowerShell
Developer
Transient data in SQL Server
Getting to grips with Service Broker.
2005 SQLCMD Scripting
Understanding LINQ in .NET Framework V3.5 and Beyond
Development Life Cycle using Visual Studio Team Edition for DB Professionals
Making the leap into Advanced SQL

Regards
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
UK SQL Server User Group<>

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Proposed sessions are now available on http://www.sqlbits.com/information/PublicSessions.aspx where you can also vote for your favourite 10.

Voting closes in a couple of weeks so please do your voting today!

Unfortunately, we have had to cancel tonight's meeting due to illness.  Apologies for very late notice.  We hope to reschedule in the New Year.  Keep an eye on www.suguk.org and www.vbug.com/events for news of a new program of meetings for the North East in the New Year!

Happy Christmas and Best Wishes for the New Year to all!

Tony Rogerson has just sent the details through regarding the opening on speaker session submissions for the second SQL Bits event, this time held in Birmingham on Saturday 1st March 2008.  This is another great community event, it's free, it's on a Saturday and if SQL is your bag then I recommend attendance.  Even better if you feel like speaking why not submit a session?

The October SQL Bits was a resounding success, we had 321 delegates on the day and feedback was brilliant, hot on the success of that conference we have started the planning for the next SQL Bits conference which will be held at the Lakeside Conference Centre in Birmingham on 1st March 2008.

We are looking for sessions that cover any topic related to SQL Server, Database Administration like Design, High Availability, Tuning etc.., Development like coding (application, CLR etc..), Business Intelligence - “ SSAS, SSIS, SSRS etc...“ Basically anything you think relevant and would interest the general SQL professional using SQL Server whether full or part time.

Please submit your sessions to http://www.sqlbits.com/information/sessionsubmission.aspx, any problems or questions please email me tonyrogerson@torver.net and I'll do my best to answer.

Sessions are 60 minutes; although we can split the sessions up into multiples if you feel you only want to do part of that time.
The deadline for session submission is 25th December so get your session proposals in quickly!